Description

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1893 edition. Excerpt: ...The authors of some of these papers evidently seized this oppor-. tunity to vent their maglignant hatred of their late enemies, even though they had to falsify the truths of history to do it. Contemporaneous histories are usually u.nreliable on account of the bias of their authors. The writer must pander to the prejudices of his constituents by abusing those of the opposite side if he would make his wares salable. The element of the fabulous enters largely into all one sided histories of any great contest. The histories of the conquest of California abound in numerous examples of this. We never have had, and probably never will have, a history of that event written by a Mexican or native Californian. We look at it from the American side only. Most of the contemporaneous writers on the American side seem to have been in spired by two motives; first, to /magnify the numbers, and, secondly, to debase the character of their opponents. Stockton, s military and naval reports of the conquest of California abound in misrepresentations and fabulous stories. The Commodore was a veritable Munchausen, when narrating his own exploits. Stockton, in reporting his first expedition down the coast, reported that he had chased the Mexican army 300 miles along the coast, driven them into the interior and dispersed them in the mountains. Exactly how he, on board the frigate "Congress," out of sight of land, could chase the Mexican army over the mountains of the Coast Range, 300 miles down the coast, is a military and naval exploit that the Commodore does not explain. Tuthill (usually considered a reliable historian), describing Stockton's second expedition down this coast, says: "Stockton effected a landing of his troops at San Pedro on...show more